I think dubbing songs is an antiquated method nowadays. I don't really know any companies or shows who do it anymore. Of course they probably could if they wanted to like with Rei's insert song from Sailor Moon R, but it would cost more money.

Years ago, dubbing companies usually had full control over what they were allowed to edit and change, but now the original distributors have gotten more control over what's allowed to be changed. One of the hardest things to do is get permission to dub songs, not only do you need permission from the original lyricist, but you also might need permission from the original singer and possibly whoever else may have worked on the song. More often then not, the original artists prefer to have their work unaltered...which is why anime theme songs getting translated is pretty much a thing of the past.

Know why the Viz translation of Moonlight Densetsu is so awkward? It's because Viz wasn't even allowed to translate it themselves, instead the original Japanese lyricist did which is why it has odd structure and random Japanese words left in...English isn't the lyricist's first language. Interestingly, according to Viz, the original lyricist gave a reason for not letting it get dubbed. The reason? The lyricist believed the message of the song "transcends language".

This doesn't just effect anime either. Godzilla vs the Smog Monster(Renamed Godzilla Vs Hedora in later releases.) originally had a song in the movie that was dubbed in English, but some time in the 90s it was released with a new dub and the song was left in Japanese.

Really, we're extremely lucky that Viz got permission to dub Rei's song in episode 54. It's entirely possible it could have remained in Japanese, like that Godzilla movie.

Years ago, dubbing companies usually had full control over what they were allowed to edit and change, but now the original distributors have gotten more control over what's allowed to be changed. One of the hardest things to do is get permission to dub songs, not only do you need permission from the original lyricist, but you also might need permission from the original singer and possibly whoever else may have worked on the song. More often then not, the original artists prefer to have their work unaltered...which is why anime theme songs getting translated is pretty much a thing of the past.

Know why the Viz translation of Moonlight Densetsu is so awkward? It's because Viz wasn't even allowed to translate it themselves, instead the original Japanese lyricist did which is why it has odd structure and random Japanese words left in...English isn't the lyricist's first language. Interestingly, according to Viz, the original lyricist gave a reason for not letting it get dubbed. The reason? The lyricist believed the message of the song "transcends language".

This doesn't just effect anime either. Godzilla vs the Smog Monster(Renamed Godzilla Vs Hedora in later releases.) originally had a song in the movie that was dubbed in English, but some time in the 90s it was released with a new dub and the song was left in Japanese.

Really, we're extremely lucky that Viz got permission to dub Rei's song in episode 54. It's entirely possible it could have remained in Japanese, like that Godzilla movie.

It's quite sad, really. When you do it right you get things like Smile Bomb, the first OP for Yu Yu Hakusho that was dubbed.

I remember hearing that the company releasing the new Mexican DVDs tried dubbing more songs into Spanish, and even began doing so, but the new recordings couldn't be on the new releases because they couldn't get approval from the Japanese. It's weird because Viz said singing talent was a consideration when casting the new voice actresses for the Sailor Guardians. However, it looks like they're only dubbing the songs sung in-universe by the characters themselves, meaning only Cristina Vee (Rei) and Cherami Leigh (Minako) will be the only ones actually using their talents. I guess it's too expensive.

I remember hearing that the company releasing the new Mexican DVDs tried dubbing more songs into Spanish, and even began doing so, but the new recordings couldn't be on the new releases because they couldn't get approval from the Japanese.

Yesterday night, on the Talk Box Moon Facebook page, it was revealed that the song "Princess Moon" for the upcoming Talk Box Mercury will not be dubbed in Spanish (nor any of the upcoming songs) by explicit orders of the creator of the franchise.

The company, at the time of Episode 4 of Plan B's podcast, had not yet decided which singer would be singing the song (Princess Moon): Marisa de Lille or Chilean singer Salome Anjari. Finally, it was decided de Lille would be singing the songs, and even recorded the songs in Spanish. It would seem this imposition was last minute from Takeuchi's part.

The Mexican singer (de Lille) revealed through a Wall post on her Facebook page, that these recorded versions (Princess Moon and Otome no Policy) would be available on her personal web page in the future, however, with this new antecedent it's up in the air if these songs will ever be made public.

Marisa de Lille sang the original opening and ending themes in Spanish (Moonlight Densetsu and Heart Moving) for the Sailor Moon soundtrack in Latin America. She also sang an undetermined number of insert songs from the series in Spanish, of which only "Maboroshi no Ginzuisho" was used, while the songs that did not appear were lost among the archives of the former studio Intertrack. Princess Moon and Otome no Policy were never dubbed in Latin American Spanish (before). Talk Box Mercury has an estimated release date of June of this year.

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Personal thoughts:Wow this actually really pisses me off. It makes me wonder just what kind of crack Naoko is smoking when she makes these sorts of decisions. Why the hell cockblock a good thing like this? It's not like Moonlight Densetsu or Heart Moving weren't an accurate interpretation of the original Japanese ones. the fact they had these songs ready to go, just for Naoko to say "SRY NO" makes me really want to choke someone.

PurpleWarrior13 wrote:

It's weird because Viz said singing talent was a consideration when casting the new voice actresses for the Sailor Guardians. However, it looks like they're only dubbing the songs sung in-universe by the characters themselves, meaning only Cristina Vee (Rei) and Cherami Leigh (Minako) will be the only ones actually using their talents. I guess it's too expensive.

Joined: Aug 16, 2003Posts: 1254Location: E-5 (I have a full scale US map)

NeoQueenSerenity18 wrote:

Why didn't we get songs like Moonlight Densetsu or the others dubbed?

Really? You really want to hear those Japanese songs in English?

Case in point: Tenchi Muyou Ryo Oh Ki OVAs.

The English and Japanese lyrics aren't even a translation of each other. In Pioneer's case, they tried to write a new song in English. Sometimes it was OK.

In the case of English songs for Sailor Moon, DiC / Optimum just wrote new songs, which were pretty good most of the time. That OP? *shudder* yecch.

But to write Moonlight Densetsu in English? It's really hard to accurately translate a song from one language to another and still have it correct if you want a singable lyric. It further ruins the matter by rewriting the translation into singable lyrics. I have never favored "rewriting" a translation away from being accurate.

The same case could be made for listening to opera in English. Purists want to know what the lyrics say rather than hearing an amateurish "translation" with an attempt to make it singable. There's a number of Youtube videos of people trying to do this with Sailor Moon songs - I have to close the tab after 5 seconds. It's just grating on the nerves.

Just sub it, translate it right, and go on.

_________________I know so little, but at least I know it fluently!

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The English and Japanese lyrics aren't even a translation of each other. In Pioneer's case, they tried to write a new song in English. Sometimes it was OK.

In the case of English songs for Sailor Moon, DiC / Optimum just wrote new songs, which were pretty good most of the time. That OP? *shudder* yecch.

But to write Moonlight Densetsu in English? It's really hard to accurately translate a song from one language to another and still have it correct if you want a singable lyric. It further ruins the matter by rewriting the translation into singable lyrics. I have never favored "rewriting" a translation away from being accurate.

The same case could be made for listening to opera in English. Purists want to know what the lyrics say rather than hearing an amateurish "translation" with an attempt to make it singable. There's a number of Youtube videos of people trying to do this with Sailor Moon songs - I have to close the tab after 5 seconds. It's just grating on the nerves.

Just sub it, translate it right, and go on.

On the other hand, it's extremely jarring when you're watching an anime like Love Live that is so heavily focused around music to have the characters be speaking in English when they're just talking but then suddenly shift to their Japanese voices when they start singing. All translations are interpretations of what the original is saying and no translation is going to be exactly 100% the same as what's being said in Japanese, so I never understood why purist fans get outraged that dubs would interpret something to make it flow more natural in spoken English. If you want all your translated theme songs to be super literal, that's how you get messes like the Viz translation of Moonlight Densetsu. I personally love the dub Tenchi theme songs but I don't know that it's fair to use a dub that's over 20 years old as an example. There have been plenty of other better dubs since then that did a fair job of dubbing theme songs. Someone already mentioned Yu Yu Hakusho but I also love the dubbed versions of the Fruits Basket and Ouran High School Club theme songs. All of Funimation's dub theme songs for One Piece are really good too. I also love the English theme song they used in the dub of Princess Mononoke. It doesn't really bother me to have the theme songs in the credits in Japanese but it is kind of weird to have the insert songs in Japanese while everyone is speaking in English in the dub.

Has Viz confirmed its a legal issue? The Hebrew dub was able to dub most of the songs, and Italy dubbed the opening to Sailor Moon Crystal. I think they just don't want to bother.

The Hebrew dub was done long before that whole situation with Mexico happened.

There was also a situation with the Cantonese dub in which there was a new version of their Opening song done for Hong Kong's J2 broadcast because of legal issues but the song was dropped when they got to R with Moonlight Densetsu kept intact starting from there (I'd post both J2 OPs but they seem to be long gone ).

As for Crystal in Italy, It's strange because those songs never got dubbed anywhere else. Aren't Portugal & France more known to dub anime songs than over here? I know Portugal did for Dragon Ball Super's opening (as terrible as it is) for it's broadcast on SIC...

Wait, Viz dubbed Moonlight Densetsu in the episodes? I never saw the new dub so what did it sound like?

Terrible. The song literally begins with the words "Gomen ne" sung by the English voice actors, with the rest of the words in the first lyric sung in English, resulting in the first line being "Gomen ne it's hard for me to say..." And the whole song is like that with random bits of Japanese tossed around the English lyrics, which themselves are more of a literal translation that anything and don't account for the rhythm of the song at all.

And in some cases, the translation is questionable in its accuracy, such as its decision to translate the final line of "Mirakuru Romansu" (which is obviously the English words "Miracle Romance" spoken in Japanese phonetics) as "This is the miracle of romance", which completely misses the intention behind the phrase "miracle romance" referring to the miraculous nature of the romance itself (as in, the romance between Usagi/Serenity and Mamoru/Endymion that was so strong that it miraculously transcended time and space between their past and present lives) instead of referring to the romantic nature of a miracle that the translation now speaks of. A much better translation of this line, one that keeps the original intent and accounts for the song's rhythm, would have been something like "This is a miracle romance."

Of course, this song is supposed to song awful in how badly Usagi and Naru, and later Naru and Umino, sing it in episode 7. And it was Kindergarten children who sang it in episode 52, so they get a pass for any iffyness on their own singing abilities. But regardless, that still doesn't excuse the official English translation of this song being objectively dreadful in and of itself.

The new Korean dub also redubbed a lot of the insert songs. That one came out last year.

Well yeah, but there's issues between Korea and Japan on account of their history, so you know...

I remember they censored all japanese words on-screen when the old dub aired.I think they just can't air japanese songs on cartoons there. Also the israeli channel chose to air really messy videos as openings or endings whenever there were no creditless versions available.Maybe when the countries have stricter standards regarding foreign language on children's programming, the japanese make exceptions. Also, they tend to look English-language releases closer because... you know, they want their anime series to become a hit the US more than anywhere else.And there are cases and cases. The brazilians were able to dub Dragon Ball Kai songs for example, but couldn't do the same with the songs on the latest DB movies because japanese artists like FLOW didn't allow their work to get translated.

And there are cases and cases. The brazilians were able to dub Dragon Ball Kai songs for example, but couldn't do the same with the songs on the latest DB movies because japanese artists like FLOW didn't allow their work to get translated.

With the two DBZ movies, that was all on Toei because they had made 2 separate masters for them, one which has the FLOW & Momoiro Clover Z songs in Japanese, and the other with them in Engrish (which also affected the Japanese versions internationally), that's the reason FUNi & everyone else weren't allowed to dub those songs because they were already in English, same with the Majin Buu arc of Kai which has it's own Engrish OP & ED song.

And there are cases and cases. The brazilians were able to dub Dragon Ball Kai songs for example, but couldn't do the same with the songs on the latest DB movies because japanese artists like FLOW didn't allow their work to get translated.

With the two DBZ movies, that was all on Toei because they had made 2 separate masters for them, one which has the FLOW & Momoiro Clover Z songs in Japanese, and the other with them in Engrish (which also affected the Japanese versions internationally), that's the reason FUNi & everyone else weren't allowed to dub those songs because they were already in English, same with the Majin Buu arc of Kai which has it's own Engrish OP & ED song.

Engrish version by the same artists, right? Well, as far as I can tell from going to the theaters to watch DBZ BoG, the brazilian dub had the songs in japanese rather than english. But I can be wrong, it was 3 years ago. The first half of DB Kai had all songs dubbed into brazilian portuguese, though. The second half is yet to premiere, probably this year.